John Bogert: Candidates just plain out of touch

I have spent far too many years hearing wannabe presidents promising to end abortion (when they actually can't) and to create jobs by wand and spell while pledging to move America in the "right direction."

But what's "right?" Nobody explains. And how about Mitt Romney, a rich guy gotten massively richer by restructuring "ordinary working Americans" out of their ordinary livelihoods.

Still, I semi-like the man because he knows that capitalism requires government welfare while somehow still noticing that human beings require medical care. But I largely like him because he's Mormon and, despite the wholesome Donny and Marie vibe, it's just time that one of their faith (or any other unrepresented faith) moves into the People's House.

Seriously, am I the only person who noticed how in 235 years we've had only one non-Protestant-like president? Besides, Willard Mitt Romney can't even sound convincing when he bashes "Obamacare" while simultaneously claiming that Bain Capital is exactly the kind of outfit supported by ordinary Americans who are forever "sitting around their kitchen tables" making hard budgetary decisions.

You know, like should we keep our New Hampshire and Boston mansions while quadrupling the square footage of our $12million La Jolla spread?

Then there's the candidate fringe group led at the moment by Rick Santorum, a man who I want to like because we are both Italian Catholics but can't because he seems to be channeling Pope Paul V, the tiny-minded pontiff who killed off the Italian Renaissance by setting in motion the trial of Galileo.

Somehow the former senator and I emerged from the same America, the one that rarely spoke of deeply held personal beliefs mainly (I think) because we used to understand how idiotic so many deeply held personal beliefs sound when spoken out loud.

Only Santorum is a celebrity. And we all know that celebrities are magical and entitled, even if they wear sweater vests.

But instead of explaining how he'll move us in the "right" direction, this grandson of an immigrant uses his political celebrity to savage the only group in America that can still be attacked with impunity: Gays and lesbians. Specifically, gay and lesbian Americans who choose to marry and raise children.

Last week, the former Pennsylvania senator told reporters that it was so important for children to have one male daddy and one female mommy that an imprisoned, abandoning father would be preferable to a present and nurturing same-sex parent.

He then cited an unnamed anti-poverty "expert" who allegedly claimed that "fathers in jail who had abandoned their kids were still better than no father at all. ..."

Translation: An absent dirtball is better than a good gay or lesbian parent. Then again, the man also believes that gay marriage leads to human/pet marriage.

Still, I have to wonder who the candidates are referring to when they talk about the sacred American family. Census figures released in June show that the fastest-growing demographic in California is single-parent families. These experienced a 20 percent increase over 10 years to make up 11.8percent of all state households.

Meanwhile, unmarried partner arrangements were up 20 percent to 6.2 percent of the population while same-sex partners increased 25 percent to make up 1 percent of our number. This as traditional nuclear families fell 10 points to 23.4 percent of our state's population and married couples sans children rose 4 percent to represent 26 percent of all households.

During my own decade in the single-parent world, I might have felt marginalized had I not met so many other single parents and same-sex-partner parents. I don't know why, but when you fall out of the mainstream myth you tend to meet people of your own ilk.

In my experience, this ilk doesn't appear to be much different than any other as it works itself to death trying to do what's best for the children.

Still, politics at its very worst requires scapegoats and raw emotion. Certain members of certain Christian sects dismiss 6.3million American Mormons as a mere sect. This as gay and lesbian parents are openly mocked by Lord-praising candidates floating a caustic smoke screen that works every single time.